


the road home

by cirrus (themorninglark)



Series: Sportsfest 2018 [29]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Gen, Sportsfest 2018
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-05
Updated: 2018-08-05
Packaged: 2019-06-22 03:26:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15572718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themorninglark/pseuds/cirrus
Summary: The backseat is full of echoes. Some sweet as summer and caramel pudding, others, old scabs they’ve been picking at for years.Atsumu and Osamu on long drives home, in the summer and the winter.





	the road home

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Sportsfest 2018 Remix Round | [originally posted here](https://sportsfest.dreamwidth.org/7730.html?thread=1574962#cmt1574962)

When Atsumu drives, Osamu always sleeps in the passenger seat. He knows it’s maddening for Atsumu, not to have anyone to talk to, when it’s just them on a long empty highway speeding into a lonely morning. Two hours ago, he’d tickled Osamu to keep him awake. They had veered dangerously onto the road shoulder and Osamu had shouted at him, and in that moment it had dawned on him that since they parted ways, he had not shouted at Atsumu in person like this and in their mom’s banged-up hand-me-down Honda Civic, there are only so many places your voice can go.

The backseat is full of echoes. Some sweet as summer and caramel pudding, others, old scabs they’ve been picking at for years. Atsumu’s silence is louder than all of his words, but it suits Osamu fine. As far as he’s concerned, there’s nothing like the rhythm of a steady road and the familiar sound of Atsumu’s breathing to make him nod off.

He only opens his eyes when the car slows down. Atsumu is so rarely slow. They are approaching a winding road that leads to a bluff, and Atsumu comes to a screeching halt because he doesn’t know how to slow down quietly. He shakes Osamu, grinning too hard for Osamu to be mad at him for waking him up.

_Look, Samu, look at that view—_

Atsumu opens the door on his side of the car, and as he unbuckles his seat belt and steps out, a blast of fresh morning air hits Osamu. Years ago, their parents had brought them camping in the countryside; years ago, they had shared a tent and sat here, looking up at the sunrise. It is a smaller sun now, or perhaps they are bigger.

Osamu sleeps because he feels safe, though he’ll never tell Atsumu. Outside, the sky lights up their old car in bronze and gold.

 

* * *

 

When Osamu drives, Atsumu thinks of snow.

 _Let me take over,_ Osamu had said, reaching out to lay a hand on Atsumu’s white-knuckled grip on the wheel. In this harsh season, the sleet comes down thick and fast, without warning. They are at the halfway point between their universities and Atsumu’s spent the whole journey back south complaining about the cold and the fog. It’s not like complaining makes him feel any _warmer_. It’s just easier to deal with it when Osamu’s listening. Osamu has not been around to listen for months and months and the road is slippery and Atsumu’s hitting the brake so hard he’ll burn a hole through the floor of the car, in the road, and then Osamu is touching his shoulder and he remembers to let go.

They switch sides. Atsumu does not complain about this.

He can’t sleep. Beyond the windows is a landscape of fields and telephone wires like a black and white photograph, a lone bird silhouetted in the darkening sky, and it is very beautiful, and Atsumu turns the heating up, stretches and yawns. Osamu is wearing his favourite sweater. He’ll be warm, Atsumu knows, by the end of this drive. He will be too warm, for he likes it a little colder than Atsumu.

Atsumu smiles. The radio is jammed on the same news channel their mom always listened to when they were little. Osamu says he likes it, the drone of the weather report, so Atsumu leaves it on. They will not argue, for there will be time for that; Osamu raising his voice is a luxury Atsumu cannot afford when it’s his twin behind the wheel. They are together now and they are covered with moonlight and home is waiting at the end of the road. They are together now and there will be time.


End file.
